Insurance & Protection Calculators

No. Every tool here is an estimate built from your inputs and published rate data, and none of them contacts an insurer. A real premium depends on underwriting — your health, claims history, credit in most states, and the specific carrier — so treat these numbers as the right order of magnitude for planning and budgeting, then get actual quotes before buying.

The DIME method is the usual starting point: total your Debts, the Income you would need to replace over the years your family depends on it, the Mortgage balance, and future Education costs. That figure is typically far higher than the flat multiple-of-salary rules of thumb suggest, which is why the multiples tend to leave families short.

Two separate dates. You can request cancellation once the loan reaches 80% of the original value, and the servicer must cancel automatically at 78% based on the original amortization schedule. Extra principal payments move the request date forward but do not move the automatic date, which is fixed by statute. FHA loans use MIP instead, and the rules there are different — most FHA MIP cannot be cancelled at all.

No — insure it for what it would cost to rebuild. Market value includes your land, and land does not burn down. In high-value markets rebuild cost is often well below market value; in older or rural markets it can be well above it. Sizing coverage from the listing price is one of the more common and expensive mistakes in homeowners policies.

Sometimes. COBRA wins when your household income stays high enough that no marketplace subsidy applies, when you are mid-year and have already met a large deductible, or when a specific doctor or ongoing treatment is only in the employer plan's network. Otherwise a subsidised marketplace plan is usually cheaper, because at a reduced income the premium tax credit does most of the work.